


I'll break this grand design

by therestisdetail



Category: Boardwalk Empire
Genre: Alternate Universe - Superheroes/Superpowers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-04
Updated: 2015-02-04
Packaged: 2018-03-10 11:43:12
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 806
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3289082
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/therestisdetail/pseuds/therestisdetail
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>More often than not it’s fairly mundane; a bite of a meal, a woman laughing, a tune that isn’t written yet. Even when it isn’t, he usually doesn’t understand the importance until long after the fact. That’s just the way it goes. </p><p>  <span class="small">(The Team NY superpowers!au that absolutely no one asked for.)</span></p>
            </blockquote>





	I'll break this grand design

 

**(Charlie)**

Charlie has premonitions. He has no real control of it, the _when_ or the _what_ of the things he sees. More often than not it’s fairly mundane; a bite of a meal, a woman laughing, a tune that isn’t written yet. Even when it isn’t, he usually doesn’t understand the importance until long after the fact. That’s just the way it goes.

Except, sometimes. Sometimes he’s walking out of an alley with that strange warmth twisting low in his stomach that’s been there ever since the jew kid told them to go fuck themselves. Sometimes he’s got blood on his knuckles and his back to a boy who can’t stand back up yet, but he feels a little bit like he’s the one who got hit, he feels a little bit like he wants to turn around. Which is fucking crazy. He’s got a thousand reasons and a fistful of pride saying not to. He’s not gonna turn around, and tells himself so.

And then just for a handful of seconds he sees: himself, older. A little marked around the edges, a little worse for wear, heavier in a way that’s comforting. Leaning over and handing his cigarette to the man across the table, who has steady hands but is breathing a bit too sharp, who uses it to light his own without missing a beat and looks up and across and-

It’s fairly mundane, of course. And it’s not like the face was familiar enough that he’s _certain_.

He’s not _sure_.

He turns around.

 

**(Meyer)**

Meyer can shift the world just by thinking it. Or that’s how Charlie puts it, and Meyer gives him a that _look_ before shaking his head and returning to his books, pencil twitching in his fingers. Benny thinks that it’s hilarious that of the three of them, it’s Meyer who can crack glass when his temper flares, Meyer who makes the lights flicker and doors slam all by themselves. Charlie thinks about the alternatives and decides it’s probably the only reason they’ve survived so long.

It’s the most physical of all the quirks their little family has, and the most obvious. Meyer is careful, always careful. But it’s not _careful_ that has him standing the alleyway after the poker game that went too long, fingers wrapped around hard leather. It’s the fact that he knows he could do it so easily, from afar. A misfire. A faulty car brake. A slip on a broken tile. That fucker choked by his own tie, all alone and frantic with confusion.

No, this is about knowing. Knowing who can stand up and take things into their own hands. His own hands. And he tells the dying man so, over and over, in the tongue he won’t understand but that matters most.

This is personal, because it’s AR, because sometimes it’s the fathers that hurt you the most that give you what you need, in the end.

 

**(Benny)**

Benny feels everything. (“Yes, that means _everything_ , you dumb dago fuck. Whatcha so worried about?” and Charlie turns away. Benny counts his victories.) He feels people. Their anger. Their fear. Their smugness, like ants on his skin. The anticipation of violence, sweet like fire down the back of his throat. The other things too, all the duller things, that weigh him down and make him want to set _something_ alight. He feels everyone. He always knows. He’ll laugh before the first shot is fired, every damn time.

He can’t turn it off.

Above all else he feels Meyer’s regard. His… his fondness. It’s not sweet, but it is warm, and it nestles and sets its roots in him and won’t let go. He doesn’t want it to, but it’s a terrible thing to see what love looks like. He sees Charlie’s, arching out towards Meyer haphazard but fearless, bright little pieces. It’s awful. He sees Meyer’s in return, direct and all-encompassing. That’s worse. But not as bad, nowhere near as bad, as when he feels that same warmth on his own skin and knows for certain how much Meyer cares.

If he didn’t, Benny could just hate him. But no, he has to feel it, know it’s _real_ , because it’s right there between his fingers and bright and it just won’t die no matter what he does and-

And he knows he has to _share._

 

**(… and everyone else)**

They don’t know. They can’t, of course, no one can ever know.

They talk, though.

It starts off easy enough. A joke, right? That Luciano kid, he’s a lucky one. Always the lucky one.

Then the names. Bugsy, that one, and I tell you he’s crazy. Like he don’t have no control.

And slower, quieter and more uncertain; the little one. Lansky. It’s when he goes all still-like. That’s when you gotta run.

But no one _knows._


End file.
